Wednesday, July 12, 2017

Meet Ghanaian Father Who Has 100 Children with 12 Wives

As
the entire world mark the World Population Day, one man in Ghana has
100 reasons to mark his particular contribution as he makes new
revelations on his life.

Tuesday, July 11, was World Population Day, and one man in Ghana,
80-year-old Kofi Asilenu, who is the father of 100 children by 12 wives,
has reasons to mark his particular contribution.

Kofi lives with his family in a village called Amankrom, a
45-minute drive from the capital Accra. His family make up a third of
the 600 people in the village.

While speaking exclusively to a BBC Africa correspondent, he said that he wanted a big family because he did not have siblings:

"I don’t have any brother or uncle, that’s why I decided to
have many children so that they can give me a befitting burial when I
die. In my home town if you give birth to one child they will say you
are important so I want to have many children."

His big family has, however, come at a cost. He says that he was
well off financially, but his resources have mostly been drained due to
the cost of raising such a large brood, even though he says now he gets
financial help from his children.

Kofi Asilenu looks physically strong and even says he is willing to
have more children - despite having mistakenly proposed to one of his
daughters three years ago.

The embarrassing incident meant he was forced to apologise to her,
explaining that he had an eye problem so he could not recognise her.

As for his wives, they are all happy with the set up.

First wife Nayome Asilenu told the BBC: "When I married my
husband and he decided to marry more women, I didn’t have any option.
He’s able to take care of us, pay the children’s school fees. They are
healthy and strong so there’s nothing wrong with that."

Polygamy was preferred in Ghana, to have many children was seen as a
symbol of wealth. However, things have changed with women having more
control on deciding how many children they can have and also birth
control measures have been promoted nationwide.